Blair House, 17 St George’s Road, Toorak; a nice but not exceptional 1936 Georgian Revival design by Hughes & Orme (never heard of them I admit). Recently sold for the second highest price in Melb, $75 mill. Beautiful large gardens. It’s protected by a Heritage Overlay, so should be with us a while yet. Photos … Continue reading Top price in Toorak →

5 January 2021 The exotically named ‘Cairo’, Nicholson Street Fitzroy - a set of ‘bachelor flats’ with those famous cantilevered stairs. Many flats are compact #bedsits, with huge windows mostly facing north, with little balconies, so very light (perhaps too light in summer before the trees grew?). There’s 26 of those, while another 10 are … Continue reading Cairo, Fitzroy →

Spotted in Wellington Street St Kilda - and I like it ! Stacked shiny boxes. A bit crazy big for a house, but built for builder David McCallum and partner and children and their partners - some of the bedrooms are the size of a one bed flat or studio, but they shared the huge … Continue reading Stacked boxes in St Kilda →

July 2022 Proposed office tower behind the Comedy Theatre - looks like half is on a separate site (now a carpark) and half perhaps over the back stage, partly cantilevered structurally. That part actually on the Comedy site has to be approved by #HeritageVictoria, so there’s a long process. They might not like it, but … Continue reading Comedy Theatre tower proposal →

Above the awnings - St Mathew’s Church Hall and Sunday School, High Street Prahran near Chapel Street, 1891, Laver & Fick. Great bit of Gothic Revival, unusually large for a church hall, and built on the street, and across a side street from the actual church (which was never finished and cut in half inside … Continue reading St Mathews Church Hall Prahran →

Some more Lost Melbourne. Here is a selection of some of the Victorian skyscrapers all built between 1888 and 1891 and all now gone. They were built on the strength of a boom in land values which crashed in 1892, and the use of hydraulic elevators powered by a pressurised water system under the streets. … Continue reading Lost Victorian Skyscrapers →

This is the Flinders Street Station we nearly got ! Which isn’t so different from what was actually built, makes you wonder what the competition was for. In early 1899, the Railway Commissioners released this design, and Parliament agreed to pay for it, but changed their minds- then held a completion later that year, which … Continue reading Flinders Street Station prequel →

This is the amazing but long gone Equitable Building, nw cnr of Collins and Elizabeth. It was designed about 1890, and took 6 years to build, out of grant and thick brick walls and a steel frame (the first here). It was designed by Edward E Raht, German born, Paris trained, and who had worked … Continue reading Equitable Building, via New York →

15 March 2022 The design for the NGV Contemporary on Southbank has been released, and I really like it! I think the architect Angelo Candelapas is doing things nobody else is doing - a kind of very refined Brutalism that ends up beautiful. Almost all his work is in Sydney so far. I like very … Continue reading NGV Contemporary →

Finally got to the city to see some things for myself - like Nauru House and the newish 80 Collins finished - separated by a 6m gap ! There weren’t any rules that anyone taking any notice of when this one got a permit in 2011. And looks like there’s a similar gap to the … Continue reading 80 Collins, ex Nauru House →